The Sui ecosystem welcomes a new storage solution: Decentralization storage network Walrus analysis

The decentralized storage network Arweave successfully triggered a revival of its ecosystem after launching its computing layer AO. As a general-purpose computing chain, the decentralized storage network Walrus launched by Sui has also attracted industry attention.

Background Overview

Walrus is the latest decentralized storage network product launched by Mysten Labs. Mysten Labs is the development company behind Sui, and most of its founders and employees come from the now-defunct blockchain project Diem by Meta (formerly Facebook).

Walrus is built on Sui and utilizes Sui to coordinate storage space and metadata sales, but using Walrus does not require developing applications on Sui. Walrus will launch a standalone governance token WAL as a functional token.

Challenges of Storage Technology

Existing decentralized storage systems are mainly divided into two categories: fully replicated systems and systems using Reed-Solomon (RS) coding. Fully replicated systems, such as a well-known storage platform, have the advantage of complete files being available on storage nodes, but they require a large amount of storage space. RS coding systems split files into small chunks, but the computational overhead of the encoding and decoding process limits the file size and the number of participating nodes.

In addition, all decentralized storage systems face two main challenges: the need for continuous verification to ensure data integrity, and the need for complex coordination mechanisms among storage nodes.

Walrus's Innovative Solutions

Walrus has introduced a new type of 2D encoding algorithm called RedStuff, specifically designed for Byzantine fault tolerance. RedStuff is based on fountain codes, combining fast operation with high reliability.

The main innovations include:

1. Encoding through a simple XOR operation improves the encoding/decoding speed.
2. Low storage overhead allows the system to scale to hundreds of nodes.
3. High elasticity and fault tolerance, able to recover data even in the case of Byzantine faults.
4. Efficient committee reconfiguration protocol ensures continuous data availability.
5. Asynchronous challenge protocol to verify that nodes correctly store data.
6. Staking-based economic model, combined with reward and penalty mechanisms.

Walrus uses Sui as a control layer, allowing it to focus on solving the core issues of Decentralization storage.

Future Outlook

The Walrus project plans to launch an independent token, WAL, for functions such as staking and governance. Currently, Walrus is preparing to launch its testnet, and the mainnet launch date has not yet been determined. Interested developers can refer to the official documentation to learn how to use Walrus to deploy websites.

With the development of Walrus, it is expected to bring new solutions to the field of Decentralization storage, driving the entire blockchain ecosystem forward.